Recorded by Fate
by AasiyaDaya
Summary: Percy Jackson characters read the books.
1. Chapter 1

To mark the winter soltice, Demigods popped into Olympus. Literally.

Annabeth Chase, Jason and Thalia Grace, Conner and Travis Stoll, Katie Gardner, Reyna Avila Ramirez Arellano, Leo Valdez, and Nico Di Angelo popped out of this air onto the floor of the throne room.

Except they looked 16.

Eventually Zeus got his jaw off the floor, and asked, " _What._ IS THIS! THALIA! JASON!"

"Hey! There's a note!" Said Nico.

 _"Greetings Olympians and Demigods. I have sent you back in time to read the books in the box that will fall...now."_

A box fell.

 _"These books are the key to the key to humanity's survival. You must read these books together, 5 chapters a day, until all 8 are complete. Start now._

 _Best regards._

 _ **AasiyaD** " _

"Oook." Said Thalia."Let's start, if we want to get anywhere."

"Who first?" asked Athena. The rest of the Olympians had filed in, including Hades and Demeter.

"Me." Replied Annabeth, glaring at her mother. She hadn't forgotten what had happened. The Demigods took seats on the chairs that had come out from nowhere.

"No," piped Hermes. "With your dyslexia, we'll never get anywhere. I'll read"

 **I ACCIDENTALLY VAPORIZE MY PRE-ALGEBRA TEACHER**

"Why do I get the feeling that's bad?" Sighs Poseidon.

 **Look, I didn't want to be a half-blood.**

The Demigods shift.

 **If you're reading this because you think you might be one, my advice is: close this book right now.**

 **Believe what-ever lie your mom or dad told you about your birth, and try to lead a normal life.**

 **Being a half-blood is dangerous. It's scary. Most of the time, it gets you killed in painful, nasty ways.**

"I'll say." Mutters Conner.

 **If you're a normal kid, reading this because you think it's fiction, great. Read on. I envy you for being** **able to believe that none of this ever happened.**

 **But if you recognize yourself in these pages-if you feel something stirring inside-stop reading** **immediately. You might be one of us. And once you know that, it's only a matter of time before they sense it** **too, and they'll come for you.**

 **Don't say I didn't warn you.**

 **My name is Percy Jackson.**

 **I'm twelve years old. Until a few months ago, I was a boarding student at Yancy Academy, a private** **school for troubled kids in upstate New York.**

 **Am I a troubled kid?**

"Yep." Thalia said. "He suffers from impending mania."

 **Yeah. You could say that.**

"See."

 **I could start at any point in my short miserable life to prove it, but things really started going bad last**

 **May, when our sixth-grade class took a field trip to Manhattan- twenty-eight mental-case kids and two** **teachers on a yellow school bus, heading to the Metropolitan Museum of Art to look at ancient Greek** **and Roman stuff.**

Annabeth and Athena smile.

 **I know-it sounds like torture.**

Then they frown.

 **Most Yancy field trips were.**

 **But Mr. Brunner, our Latin teacher, was leading this trip, so I had hopes.**

 **Mr. Brunner was this middle-aged guy in a motorized wheelchair. He had thinning hair and a scruffy** **beard and a frayed tweed jacket, which always smelled like coffee. You wouldn't think he'd be cool, but** **he told stories and jokes and let us play games in class. He also had this awesome collection of Roman** **armor and weapons, so he was the only teacher whose class didn't put me to sleep.**

Athena looked as if she was about to start a rant. Annabeth quickly continued.

 **I hoped the trip would be okay. At least, I hoped that for once I wouldn't get in trouble.**

"Keep dreaming."

 **Boy, was** I **wrong.**

 **See, bad things happen to me on field trips. Like at my fifth-grade school, when we went to the Saratoga** **battlefield, I had this accident with a Revolutionary War cannon. I wasn't aiming for the school bus,**

Conner and Travis grinned and pulled out notebooks.

 **but** **of course I got expelled anyway. And before that, at my fourth-grade school, when we took a behind-** **the-scenes tour of the Marine World shark pool, I sort of hit the wrong lever on the catwalk and our** **class took an unplanned swim.**

Poseidon sniggered

 **And the time before that... Well, you get the idea.**

"Yep, we do."

T **his trip, I was determined to be good.**

 **All the way into the city, I put up with Nancy Bobofit, the freckly, redheaded kleptomaniac girl, hitting** **my best friend Grover in the back of the head with chunks of peanut butter-and-ketchup sandwich.**

 **Grover was an easy target. He was scrawny. He cried when he got frustrated. He must've been held back** **several grades,**

"Seven, precisely." Said Reyna, counting on her fingers.

 **because he was the only sixth grader with acne and the start of a wispy beard on his** **chin. On top of all that, he was crippled. He had a note excusing him from PE for the rest of his life** **because he had some kind of muscular disease in his legs. He walked funny, like every step hurt him, but** **don't let that fool you. You should've seen him run when it was enchilada day in the cafeteria.**

 **Anyway, Nancy Bobofit was throwing wads of sandwich that stuck in his curly brown hair, and she knew**

 **I couldn't do anything back to her because I was already on probation. The headmaster had threatened** **me with death**

"WHAT!" Came from around the room.

 **by in-school suspension**

 **"Oh."**

 **if anything bad, embarrassing, or even mildly entertaining** **happened on this trip.**

"This guy's no fun." Grumbled Conner.

 **"I'm going to kill her," I mumbled.**

 **Grover tried to calm me down. "It's okay. I like peanut butter."**

 **He dodged another piece of Nancy's lunch.**

 **"That's it." I started to get up, but Grover pulled me back to my seat.**

 **"You're already on probation," he reminded me. "You know who'll get blamed if anything happens."**

 **Looking back on it, I wish I'd decked Nancy Bobofit right then and there. In-school suspension would've** **been nothing compared to the mess I was about to get myself into.**

"Pessimist." Came from Katie.

 **Mr. Brunner led the museum tour.**

 **He rode up front in his wheelchair, guiding us through the big echoey galleries, past marble statues and** **glass cases full of really old black-and-orange pottery.**

 **It blew my mind that this stuff had survived for two thousand, three thousand years.**

"Longer." Said Athena.

 **He gathered us around a thirteen-foot-tall stone col-umn with a big sphinx on the top, and started** **telling us how it was a grave marker, a stele, for a girl about our age. He told us about the carvings on** **the sides. I was trying to listen to what he had to say, because it was kind of interesting,**

Athena nodded in approval.

 **but everybody** **around me was talking, and every time I told them to shut up, the other teacher chaperone, Mrs. Dodds,** **would give me the evil eye.**

 **Mrs. Dodds was this little math teacher from Georgia who always wore a black leather jacket, even** **though she was fifty years old. She looked mean enough to ride a Harley right into your locker. She had** **come to Yancy halfway through the year, when our last math teacher had a nervous breakdown.**

 **From her first day, Mrs. Dodds loved Nancy Bobofit and figured I was devil spawn. She would point her** **crooked finger at me and say, "Now, honey," real sweet, and I knew I was going to get after-school** **detention for a month.**

 **One time, after she'd made me erase answers out of old math workbooks until midnight, I told Grover I** **didn't think Mrs. Dodds was human. He looked at me, real seri-ous, and said, "You're absolutely right."**

"Please let me be wrong." Groaned Poseidon, turning to Hades, who grinned evilly.

 **Mr. Brunner kept talking about Greek funeral art.**

 **Finally, Nancy Bobofit snickered something about the naked guy on the stele, and I turned around and** **said, "Will you shut up?"**

"Oops."

 **It came out louder than I meant it to.**

 **The whole group laughed. Mr. Brunner stopped his story.**

 **"Mr. Jackson," he said, "did you have a comment?"**

 **My face was totally red. I said, "No, sir."**

 **Mr. Brunner pointed to one of the pictures on the stele. "Perhaps you'll tell us what this picture** **represents?"**

 **I looked at the carving, and felt a flush of relief, because I actually recognized it. "That's Kronos eating** **his kids, right?"**

 **"Yes," Mr. Brunner said, obviously not satisfied. "And he did this because ..."**

 **"Well..." I racked my brain to remember. "Kronos was the king god, and-"**

"Titan."

 **"God?" Mr. Brunner asked.**

 **"Titan," I corrected myself. "And ... he didn't trust his kids, who were the gods. So, um, Kronos ate them,** **right? But his wife hid baby Zeus, and gave Kronos a rock to eat instead. And later, when Zeus grew up,** **he tricked his dad, Kronos, into barfing up his brothers and sisters-"**

 **"Eeew!" said one of the girls behind me.**

 **"-and so there was this big fight between the gods and the Titans," I continued, "and the gods won."**

 **Some snickers from the group.**

 **Behind me, Nancy Bobofit mumbled to a friend, "Like we're going to use this in real life. Like it's going to** **say on our job applications, 'Please explain why Kronos ate his kids.'"**

"Busted." Whistled Jason

 **"And why, Mr. Jackson," Brunner said, "to paraphrase Miss Bobofit's excellent question, does this** **matter in real life?"**

 **"Busted," Grover muttered.**

 **"Shut up," Nancy hissed, her face even brighter red than her hair.**

 **At least Nancy got packed, too. Mr. Brunner was the only one who ever caught her saying anything** **wrong. He had radar ears.**

 **I thought about his question, and shrugged. "I don't know, sir."**

 **"I see." Mr. Brunner looked disappointed. "Well, half credit, Mr. Jackson. Zeus did indeed feed Kronos a** **mixture of mustard and wine, which made him disgorge his other five children, who, of course, being** **immortal gods, had been living and growing up completely undigested in the Titan's stomach. The gods** **defeated their father, sliced him to pieces with his own scythe, and scattered his remains in Tartarus,** **the darkest part of the Underworld. On that happy note, it's time for lunch. Mrs. Dodds, would you lead** **us back outside?"**

 **The class drifted off, the girls holding their stomachs, the guys pushing each other around and acting like** **doofuses.**

 **Grover and I were about to follow when Mr. Brunner said, "Mr. Jackson."**

 **I knew that was coming.**

 **I told Grover to keep going. Then I turned toward Mr. Brunner. "Sir?"**

 **Mr. Brunner had this look that wouldn't let you go- intense brown eyes that could've been a thousand** **years old and had seen everything.**

"Spot on."

 **"You must learn the answer to my question," Mr. Brunner told me.**

 **"About the Titans?"**

 **"About real life. And how your studies apply to it."**

 **"Oh."**

 **"What you learn from me," he said, "is vitally impor-tant. I expect you to treat it as such. I will accept** **only the best from you, Percy Jackson."**

 **I wanted to get angry, this guy pushed me so hard.**

 **I mean, sure, it was kind of cool on tournament days, when he dressed up in a suit of Roman armor and** **shouted: "What ho!'" and challenged us, sword-point against chalk, to run to the board and name every** **Greek and Roman person who had ever lived, and their mother, and what god they worshipped. But** **Mr. Brunner expected me to be as good as everybody else, despite the fact that I have dyslexia and a** **ttention deficit disorder and I had never made above a C- in my life. No-he didn't expect me to be as** **good; he expected me to be better. And I just couldn't learn all those names and facts, much less spell** **them correctly.**

 **I mumbled something about trying harder, while Mr. Brunner took one long sad look at the stele, like** **he'd been at this girl's funeral.**

"Probably was."

 **He told me to go outside and eat my lunch.**

* * *

 **The class gathered on the front steps of the museum, where we could watch the foot traffic along Fifth** **Avenue.**

 **Overhead, a huge storm was brewing, with clouds blacker than I'd ever seen over the city. I figured** **maybe it was global warming or something, because the weather all across New York state had been** **weird since Christmas. We'd had massive snow storms, flooding, wildfires from lightning strikes. I** **wouldn't have been surprised if this was a hurricane blowing in.**

 **Nobody else seemed to notice. Some of the guys were pelting pigeons with Lunchables crackers. Nancy** **Bobofit was trying to pickpocket something from a lady's purse, and, of course, Mrs. Dodds wasn't s** **eeing a thing.**

 **Grover and I sat on the edge of the fountain, away from the others. We thought that maybe if we did**

 **that, everybody wouldn't know we were from that school-the school for loser freaks who couldn't make** **it elsewhere.**

 **"Detention?" Grover asked.**

 **"Nah," I said. "Not from Brunner. I just wish he'd lay off me sometimes. I mean-I'm not a genius."**

 **Grover didn't say anything for a while. Then, when I thought he was going to give me some deep, philosophical comment to make me feel better, he said, "Can I have your apple?"**

 **I didn't have much of an appetite, so I let him take it.**

 **I watched the stream of cabs going down Fifth Avenue, and thought about my mom's apartment, only a** **little ways uptown from where we sat. I hadn't seen her since Christmas. I wanted so bad to jump in a** **taxi and head home. She'd hug me and be glad to see me, but she'd be disappointed, too. She'd send me** **right back to Yancy, remind me that I had to try harder, even if this was my sixth school in six years and I** **was probably going to be kicked out again. I wouldn't be able to stand that sad look she'd give me.**

 **Mr. Brunner parked his wheelchair at the base of the handicapped ramp. He ate celery while he read a** **paperback novel. A red umbrella stuck up from the back of his chair, making it look like a motorized cafe** **table.**

 **I was about to unwrap my sandwich when Nancy Bobofit appeared in front of me with her ugly friends-I** **guess she'd gotten tired of stealing from the tourists-and dumped her half-eaten lunch in Grover's lap.**

 **"Oops." She grinned at me with her crooked teeth. Her freckles were orange, as if somebody had spray-** **painted her face with liquid Cheetos.**

 **I tried to stay cool. The school counselor had told me a million times, "Count to ten, get control of your** **temper." But I was so mad my mind went blank. A wave roared in my ears.**

"Huh, sea referance."

 **I don't remember touching her, but the next thing I knew, Nancy was sitting on her butt in the fountain,** **screaming, "Percy pushed me!"**

 **Mrs. Dodds materialized next to us.**

 **Some of the kids were whispering: "Did you see-"**

 **"-the water-"**

 **"-like it grabbed her-"**

Poseidon grinned proudly

 **I didn't know what they were talking about. All I knew was that I was in trouble again.**

 **As soon as Mrs. Dodds was sure poor little Nancy was okay, promising to get her a new shirt at the** **museum gift shop, etc., etc., Mrs. Dodds turned on me. There was a triumphant fire in her eyes, as if I'd** **done something she'd been waiting for all semester. "Now, honey-"**

 **"I know," I grumbled. "A month erasing workbooks."**

"If I'm right about who that is, that was _not_ the right thing to say." Muttered Poseidon.

 **That wasn't the right thing to say.**

Demeter cackled. "Your brain has been infected, Poseidon, by the magic of the book!"

 **"Come with me," Mrs. Dodds said.**

 **"Wait!" Grover yelped. "It was me. I pushed her."**

 **I stared at him, stunned. I couldn't believe he was trying to cover for me. Mrs. Dodds scared Grover to** **death.**

 **She glared at him so hard his whiskery chin trembled.**

 **"I don't think so, Mr. Underwood," she said.**

 **"But-"**

 **"You-will-stay-here."**

 **Grover looked at me desperately.**

 **"It's okay, man," I told him. "Thanks for trying."**

 **"Honey," Mrs. Dodds barked at me. "Now."**

 **Nancy Bobofit smirked.**

 **I gave her my deluxe I'll-kill-you-later stare.**

"Not too effective, that." Muttered Thalia.

 **Then I turned to face Mrs. Dodds, but she wasn't there. She** **was standing at the museum entrance, way at the top of the steps, gesturing impatiently at me to come** **on.**

 **How'd she get there so fast?**

 **I have moments like that a lot, when my brain falls asleep or something, and the next thing I know I've** **missed something, as if a puzzle piece fell out of the universe and left me staring at the blank place** **behind it. The school counselor told me this was part of the ADHD, my brain misinterpreting things.**

The Demigods groaned.

 **I wasn't so sure.**

 **I went after Mrs. Dodds.**

 **Halfway up the steps, I glanced back at Grover. He was looking pale, cutting his eyes between me and**

 **Mr. Brunner, like he wanted Mr. Brunner to notice what was going on, but Mr. Brunner was absorbed in** **his novel. I** **looked back up. Mrs. Dodds had disappeared again. She was now inside the building, at the end of the** **entrance hall.**

 **Okay, I thought. She's going to make me buy a new shirt for Nancy at the gift shop.**

 **But apparently that wasn't the plan.**

 **I followed her deeper into the museum. When I finally caught up to her, we were back in the Greek and** **Roman section.**

 **Except for us, the gallery was empty.**

 **Mrs. Dodds stood with her arms crossed in front of a big marble frieze of the Greek gods. She was** **making this weird noise in her throat, like growling.**

 **Even without the noise, I would've been nervous. It's weird being alone with a teacher, especially Mrs.** **Dodds. Something about the way she looked at the frieze, as if she wanted to pulverize it...**

 **"You've been giving us problems, honey," she said.**

 **I did the safe thing. I said, "Yes, ma'am."**

 **She tugged on the cuffs of her leather jacket. "Did you really think you would get away with it?"**

 **The look in her eyes was beyond mad. It was evil.**

 **She's a teacher, I thought nervously. It's not like she's going to hurt me.**

Annabeth snorted.

 **I said, "I'll-I'll try harder, ma'am."**

 **Thunder shook the building.**

 **"We are not fools, Percy Jackson," Mrs. Dodds said. "It was only a matter of time before we found you** **out. Confess, and you will suffer less pain."**

 **I didn't know what she was talking about.**

 **All I could think of was that the teachers must've found the illegal stash of candy I'd been selling out of** **my dorm room. Or maybe they'd realized I got my essay on Tom Sawyer from the Internet without ever** **reading the book and now they were going to take away my grade.**

Athena's momentary approval of Poseidon's son disappeared.

 **Or worse, they were going to make** **me _read_ the book.**

 **"Well?" she demanded.**

 **"Ma'am, I don't..."**

 **"Your time is up," she hissed.**

 **Then the weirdest thing happened. Her eyes began to glow like barbecue coals. Her fingers stretched,** **turning into talons. Her jacket melted into large, leathery wings. She wasn't human. She was a shriveled** **hag with bat wings and claws and a mouth full of yellow fangs, and she was about to slice me to ribbons.**

"I was right!" Groaned Poseidon.

 **Then things got even stranger.**

 **Mr. Brunner, who'd been out in front of the museum a minute before, wheeled his chair into the**

 **doorway of the gallery, holding a pen in his hand.**

 **"What ho, Percy!" he shouted, and tossed the pen through the air.**

Poseidon smiled fondly. "Anaklusmos."

 **Mrs. Dodds lunged at me.**

 **With a yelp, I dodged and felt talons slash the air next to my ear. I snatched the ballpoint pen out of the** **air, but when it hit my hand, it wasn't a pen anymore. It was a sword-Mr. Brunner's bronze sword, which** **he always used on tournament day.**

 **Mrs. Dodds spun toward me with a murderous look in her eyes.**

 **My knees were jelly. My hands were shaking so bad I almost dropped the sword.**

 **She snarled, "Die, honey!"**

 **And she flew straight at me.**

 **Absolute terror ran through my body. I did the only thing that came naturally: I swung the sword.**

 **The metal blade hit her shoulder and passed clean through her body as if she were made of water.**

 **Hisss!**

 **Mrs. Dodds was a sand castle in a power fan. She exploded into yellow powder, vaporized on the spot,** **leaving nothing but the smell of sulfur and a dying screech and a chill of evil in the air, as if those two** **glowing red eyes were still watching me.**

"Wow, how _morbid."_

 **I was alone.**

 **There was a ballpoint pen in my hand.**

 **Mr. Brunner wasn't there. Nobody was there but me.**

 **My hands were still trembling. My lunch must've been contaminated with magic mushrooms or** **something.**

Conner and Travis pulled out notebooks again.

"What is that? Prank ideas?" Demanded Thalia. Then she jumped to her feet. "Give me those notebooks!"

The Stolls ran out of the room, with Thalia chasing them.

"Should we wait?" Asked Hephaestus.

"Nah, we'll tell them later." Answered Leo.

 **Had I imagined the whole thing?**

 **I went back outside.**

 **It had started to rain.**

 **Grover was sitting by the fountain, a museum map tented over his head. Nancy Bobofit was still** **standing there, soaked from her swim in the fountain, grumbling to her ugly friends. When she saw me,** **she said, "I hope Mrs. Kerr whipped your butt."**

 **I said, "Who?"**

 **"Our teacher. Duh!"**

 **I blinked. We had no teacher named Mrs. Kerr. I asked Nancy what she was talking about.**

 **She just rolled her eyes and turned away.**

 **I asked Grover where Mrs. Dodds was.**

 **He said, "Who?"**

 **But he paused first, and he wouldn't look at me, so I thought he was messing with me.**

 **"Not funny, man," I told him. "This is serious."**

 **Thunder boomed overhead.**

"Zeus, you are _so_ over dramatic" Hades grumbled.

 **I saw Mr. Brunner sitting under his red umbrella, reading his book, as if he'd never moved.**

 **I went over to him.**

 **He looked up, a little distracted. "Ah, that would be my pen. Please bring your own writing utensil in the** **future, Mr. Jackson."**

 **I handed Mr. Brunner his pen. I hadn't even realized I was still holding it.**

 **"Sir," I said, "where's Mrs. Dodds?"**

 **He stared at me blankly. "Who?"**

 **"The other chaperone. Mrs. Dodds. The pre-algebra teacher."**

 **He frowned and sat forward, looking mildly concerned. "Percy, there is no Mrs. Dodds on this trip. As far a** **s I know, there has never been a Mrs. Dodds at Yancy Academy. Are you feeling all right?"**

"That's a crazy ending." Said Leo.

"Who next?"

* * *

 **Date chapter was posted: 18th September 2016**

 **Next update: 24th September 2016**


	2. Chapter 2

This is set after The Lightning Thief, before The Sea Of Monsters. The Demigods are from after The Son of Neptune.

* * *

^^^READ ABOVE^^^

"I'm reading." Hades took the book as everyone stared at him. "What?"

 **THREE OLD LADIES KNIT THE SOCKS OF DEATH**

"This guy has something wrong with him." Thalia sighed.

"Runs in the family, huh." Replied Zeus, eyeing Poseidon and Hades.

 **I was used to the occasional weird experience, but usually they were over quickly. This twenty-four/seven hallucination was more than I could handle. For the rest of the school year, the entire campus seemed to be playing some kind of trick on me. The students acted as if they were completely and totally convinced that Mrs. Kerr-a perky blond woman whom I'd never seen in my life until she got on our bus at the end of the field trip-had been our per-algebra teacher since Christmas.**

 **Every so often I would spring a Mrs. Dodds reference on somebody, just to see if I could trip them up,**

"The Mist. It's not gonna work Percy." Noted Aphrodite.

 **But they would stare at me like I was psycho.**

 **It got so I almost believed them-Mrs. Dodds had never existed.**

"Almost." Nico noted.

 **Almost.**

Hades continued before Demeter could cackle.

 **But Grover couldn't fool me. When I mentioned the name Dodds to him, he would hesitate, then claim she didn't exist. But I knew he was lying.**

"He needs to be taught how to lie."

 **Something was going on. Something had happened at the museum.**

 **I didn't have much time to think about it during the days, but at night, visions of Mrs. Dodds with talons and leathery wings would wake me up in a cold sweat.**

 **The freak weather continued, which didn't help my mood. One night, a thunderstorm blew out the windows in my dorm room. A few days later, the biggest tornado ever spotted in the Hudson Valley touched down only fifty miles from Yancy Academy. One of the current events we studied in social studies class was the unusual number of small planes that had gone down in sudden squalls in the Atlantic that year.**

 **I started feeling cranky and irritable most of the time. My grades slipped from D's to F's.**

Annabeth's eyes widened. "The little idiot." She grinned, somewhat fondly.

Athena examined her daughter, noting the slight tenderness in her voice. Then she inhaled sharply. Could they be? No.

 **I got into more fights with Nancy Bobofit and her friends. I was sent out into the hallway in almost every class.**

 **Finally, when our English teacher, Mr. Nicoll, asked me for the millionth time why I was too lazy to study for spelling tests, I snapped. I called him an old sot. I wasn't even sure what it meant, but it sounded good.**

The Demigods turned to Annabeth and the Olympians turned to Athena.

"A drunkard."

 **The headmaster sent my mom a letter the following week, making it official: I would not be invited back next year to Yancy Academy.**

 **Fine, I told myself. Just fine.**

 **I was homesick.**

"Awwwww." Connor made sloppy noises, as Aphrodite frowned at him.

I **wanted to be with my mom in our little apartment on the Upper East Side, even if I had to go to public school and put up with my obnoxious stepfather and his stupid poker parties.**

 **And yet... there were things I'd miss at Yancy. The view of the woods out my dorm window, the Hudson River in the distance, the smell of pine trees. I'd miss Grover, who'd been a good friend, even if he was a little strange. I worried how he'd survive next year without me.**

 **I'd miss Latin class, too- Mr. Brunner's crazy tournament days and his faith that I could do well.**

 **As exam week got closer, Latin was the only test I studied for.**

Athena tsked.

 **I hadn't forgotten what Mr. Brunner had told me about this subject being life-and-death for me. I wasn't sure why, but I'd started to believe him.**

 **The evening before my final, I got so frustrated I threw the Cambridge Guide to Greek Mythology across my dorm room. Words had started swimming off the page, circling my head, the letters doing one-eighties as if they were riding skateboards. There was no way I was going to remember the difference between Chiron and Charon,**

 **"Ironic, seeing as he meets both in this- never mind." Annabeth cut herself off.**

 **Or Polydictes and Polydeuces. And conjugating those Latin verbs? Forget it.**

 **I paced the room, feeling like ants were crawling around inside my shirt.**

 **I remembered Mr. Brunner's serious expression, his thousand-year-old eyes.**

"I need to get Sally to get him out of English class." Mumbled Poseidon.

 **I will accept only the best from you, Percy Jackson.**

 **I took a deep breath. I picked up the mythology book.**

 **I'd never asked a teacher for help before. Maybe if I talked to Mr. Brunner, he could give me some pointers. At least I could apologize for the big fat 'F' I was about to score on his exam. I didn't want to leave Yancy Academy with him thinking I hadn't tried.**

 **I walked downstairs to the faculty offices. Most of them were dark and empty, but Mr. Brunner's door was ajar, light from his window stretching across the hallway floor. I was three steps from the door handle when I heard voices inside the office. Mr. Brunner asked a question. A voice that was definitely Grover's said, "...worried about Percy, sir."**

 **I froze. I'm not usually an eavesdropper,**

"But your best friend is talking about you to an adult."

 **But I dare you to try not listening if you hear your best friend talking about you to an adult. I inched closer.**

Demeter cackled.

 **"... alone this summer," Grover was saying. "I mean, a Kindly One in the school! Now that we know for sure, and they know too-" "**

 **We would only make matters worse by rushing him," Mr. Brunner said. "We need the boy to mature more."**

 **"But he may not have time. The summer solstice dead-line- "**

 **"Will have to be resolved without him, Grover. Let him enjoy his ignorance while he still can."**

"I wish we had that too." Said Thalia wistfully

 **"Sir, he saw her... ."**

 **"His imagination," Mr. Brunner insisted. "The Mist over the students and staff will be enough to convince him of that."**

 **"Sir, I ... I can't fail in my duties again." Grover's voice was choked with emotion.**

Connor made kissing motions.

" **You know what that would mean."**

 **"You haven't failed, Grover," Mr. Brunner said kindly. "I should have seen her for what she was. Now let's just worry about keeping Percy alive until next fall-"**

 **The mythology book dropped out of my hand and hit the floor with a thud.**

 **Mr. Brunner went silent.**

 **My heart hammering, I picked up the book and backed down the hall.**

 **A shadow slid across the lighted glass of Brunner's office door, the shadow of something much taller than my wheelchair-bound teacher, holding something that looked suspiciously like an archer's bow.**

 **I opened the nearest door and slipped inside.**

 **A few seconds later I heard a slow clop-clop-clop, like muffled wood blocks, then a sound like an animal snuffling right outside my door. A large, dark shape paused in front of the glass, then moved on.**

 **A bead of sweat trickled down my neck.**

"Percy would be awesome at hide and seek if Chiron couldn't find him." Apollo raised an eyebrow. "Speaking of which, where is Percy?"

No one answered.

 **Somewhere in the hallway, Mr. Brunner spoke. "Nothing," he murmured. "My nerves haven't been right since the winter solstice."**

 **"Mine neither," Grover said. "But I could have sworn ..."**

 **"Go back to the dorm," Mr. Brunner told him. "You've got a long day of exams tomorrow."**

 **"Don't remind me."**

 **The lights went out in Mr. Brunner's office.**

 **I waited in the dark for what seemed like forever.**

 **Finally, I slipped out into the hallway and made my way back up to the dorm.**

 **Grover was lying on his bed, studying his Latin exam notes like he'd been there all night.**

 **"Hey," he said, bleary-eyed. "You going to be ready for this test?"**

 **I didn't answer.**

 **"You look awful."**

"Duh, exams."

 **He frowned. "Is everything okay?"**

 **"Just... tired."**

 **I turned so he couldn't read my expression, and started getting ready for bed.**

 **I didn't understand what I'd heard downstairs. I wanted to believe I'd imagined the whole thing.**

 **But one thing was clear: Grover and Mr. Brunner were talking about me behind my back. They thought I was in some kind of danger.**

* * *

 **The next afternoon, as I was leaving the three-hour Latin exam, my eyes swimming with all the Greek and Roman names I'd misspelled, Mr. Brunner called me back inside. For a moment, I was worried he'd found out about my eavesdropping the night before, but that didn't seem to be the problem.**

 **"Percy," he said. "Don't be discouraged about leaving Yancy. It's ... it's for the best."**

"Chiron is honestly the worst at these stuff." Thalia rolled her eyes.

 **His tone was kind, but the words still embarrassed me. Even though he was speaking quietly, the other kids finishing the test could hear. Nancy Bobofit smirked at me and made sarcastic little kissing motions with her lips.**

 **I mumbled, "Okay, sir."**

 **"I mean ..." Mr. Brunner wheeled his chair back and forth, like he wasn't sure what to say.**

 **"This isn't the right place for you. It was only a matter of time."**

 **My eyes stung. Here was my favorite teacher, in front of the class, telling me I couldn't handle it. After saying he believed in me all year, now he was telling me I was destined to get kicked out.**

 **"Right," I said, trembling.**

 **"No, no," Mr. Brunner said. "Oh, confound it all. What I'm trying to say ... you're not normal, Percy. That's nothing to be-"**

 **"Thanks," I blurted. "Thanks a lot, sir, for reminding me."**

"Ouch." Katie said sympathetically.

 **"Percy-"**

 **But I was already gone.**

* * *

 **On the last day of the term, I shoved my clothes into my suitcase.**

 **The other guys were joking around, talking about their vacation plans. One of them was going on a hiking trip to Switzerland. Another was cruising the Caribbean for a month. They were juvenile delinquents, like me, but they were rich juvenile delinquents. Their daddies were executives, or ambassadors, or celebrities. I was a nobody, from a family of nobodies.**

 **They asked me what I'd be doing this summer and I told them I was going back to the city.**

 **What I didn't tell them was that I'd have to get a summer job walking dogs or selling magazine subscriptions, and spend my free time worrying about where I'd go to school in the fall.**

"At least you have family." Thalia said quietly.

 **"Oh," one of the guys said. "That's cool."**

 **They went back to their conversation as if I'd never existed.**

 **The only person I dreaded saying good-bye to was Grover, but as it turned out, I didn't have to. He'd booked a ticket to Manhattan on the same Greyhound as I had, so there we were, together again, heading into the city.**

 **During the whole bus ride, Grover kept glancing nervously down the aisle, watching the other passengers. It occurred to me that he'd always acted nervous and fidgety when we left Yancy, as if he expected something bad to happen. Before, I'd always assumed he was worried about getting teased.**

 **But there was nobody to tease him on the Greyhound.**

 **Finally I couldn't stand it anymore. I said, "Looking for Kindly Ones?"**

"Ooh woo!" Shouted Leo.

 **Grover nearly jumped out of his seat. "Wha-what do you mean?"**

 **I confessed about eavesdropping on him and Mr. Brunner the night before the exam.**

 **Grover's eye twitched. "How much did you hear?"**

 **"Oh ... not much. What's the summer solstice dead-line?"**

 **He winced. "Look, Percy ... I was just worried for you, see? I mean, hallucinating about demon math teachers ..."**

 **"I'm pretty sure Percy didn't say the demon part. Connor and Travis, the two of you have to teach Grover to lie." Hermes ordered.**

 **"Grover-"**

 **"And I was telling Mr. Brunner that maybe you were over stressed or something, because there was no such person as Mrs. Dodds, and ..."**

 **"Grover, you're a really, really bad liar."**

"Yep"

 **His ears turned pink.**

 **From his shirt pocket, he fished out a grubby business card. "Just take this, okay? In case you need me this summer."**

 **The card was in fancy script, which was murder on my dyslexic eyes, but I finally made out something like:**

 _ **Grover Underwood**_

 _ **Keeper**_

 _ **Half-Blood Hill**_

 _ **Long Island, New York**_

 _ **(800) 009-0009**_

 _ **"What's Half-"**_

 **"Don't say it aloud!" he yelped. "That's my, um ... summer address."**

 **My heart sank. Grover had a summer home. I'd never considered that his family might be as rich as the others at Yancy.**

Annabeth snorted.

 **"Okay," I said glumly. "So, like, if I want to come visit your mansion."**

 **He nodded. "Or ... or if you need me."**

 **"Why would I need you?"**

 **It came out harsher than I meant it to.**

 **Grover blushed right down to his Adam's apple. "Look, Percy, the truth is, I-I kind of have to protect you."**

 **I stared at him.**

 **All year long, I'd gotten in fights, keeping bullies away from him. I'd lost sleep worrying that he'd get beaten up next year without me. And here he was acting like he was the one who defended me.**

"It _is_ a funny perspective."

 **"Grover," I said, "what exactly are you protecting me from?"**

 **There was a huge grinding noise under our feet. Black smoke poured from the dashboard and the whole bus filled with a smell like rotten eggs. The driver cursed and limped the Greyhound over to the side of the highway.**

 **After a few minutes clanking around in the engine compartment, the driver announced that we'd all have to get off. Grover and I filed outside with everybody else.**

 **We were on a stretch of country road-no place you'd notice if you didn't break down there. On our side of the highway was nothing but maple trees and litter from passing cars. On the other side, across four lanes of asphalt shimmering with afternoon heat, was an old-fashioned fruit stand.**

 **The stuff on sale looked really good: heaping boxes of blood red cherries and apples, walnuts and apricots, jugs of cider in a claw-foot tub full of ice.**

Demeter and Katie smiled as the sons of Hermes wrinkled their noses.

 **There were no customers, just three old ladies sitting in rocking chairs in the shade of a maple tree, knitting the biggest pair of socks I'd ever seen. I mean these socks were the size of sweaters, but they were clearly socks.**

 **The lady on the right knitted one of them. The lady on the left knitted the other. The lady in the middle held an enormous basket of electric-blue yarn.**

 **All three women looked ancient, with pale faces wrinkled like fruit leather, silver hair tied back in white bandannas, bony arms sticking out of bleached cotton dresses. The weirdest thing was, they seemed to be looking right at me.**

 **I looked over at Grover to say something about this and saw that the blood had drained from his face. His nose was twitching.**

 **"Grover?" I said. "Hey, man-"**

 **"Tell me they're not looking at you. They are, aren't they?"**

"Uh huh." Replied Jason.

 **"Yeah. Weird, huh? You think those socks would fit me?"**

 **"Not funny, Percy. Not funny at all."**

 **The old lady in the middle took out a huge pair of scissors-gold and silver, long-bladed, like shears. I heard Grover catch his breath.**

 **"We're getting on the bus," he told me. "Come on."**

 **"What?" I said."It's a thousand degrees in there."**

 **"Come on!'" He pried open the door and climbed inside, but I stayed back. Across the road, the old ladies were still watching me. The middle one cut the yarn, and I swear I could hear that snip across four lanes of traffic.**

Poseidon paled. "Please don't let that be The Fates. Please."

 **Her two friends balled up the electric-blue socks, leaving me wondering who they could possibly be for- Sasquatch or Godzilla.**

 **At the rear of the bus, the driver wrenched a big chunk of smoking metal out of the engine compartment. The bus shuddered, and the engine roared back to life. The passengers cheered.**

Apollo scowled. "Why use a stinky 1000° bus when you can use the sun chariot?"

"Apollo, the sun chariot would be hotter." Said Reyna patiently.

"And stinkier, if you've been in it," Muttered Artemis.

"Burn!" Whooped Leo.

 **"Darn right!" yelled the driver. He slapped the bus with his hat. "Everybody back on board!" Once we got going, I started feeling feverish, as if I'd caught the flu. Grover didn't look much better. He was shivering and his teeth were chattering.**

 **"Grover?"**

 **"Yeah?"**

 **"What are you not telling me?"**

 **He dabbed his forehead with his shirt sleeve. "Percy, what did you see back at the fruit stand?"**

 **"You mean the old ladies? What is it about them, man? They're not like ... Mrs. Dodds, are they?"**

"Worse, worse, worse." Leo said rhythmically.

 **His expression was hard to read, but I got the feeling that the fruit-stand ladies were something much, much worse than Mrs. Dodds. He said, "Just tell me what you saw."**

 **"The middle one took out her scissors, and she cut the yarn."**

 **He closed his eyes and made a gesture with his fingers that might've been crossing himself, but it wasn't. It was something else, something almost-older. He said, "You saw her snip the cord."**

 **"Yeah. So?" But even as I said it, I knew it was a big deal.**

 **"This is not happening," Grover mumbled. He started chewing at his thumb. "I don't want this to be like the last time."**

 **"What last time?"**

 **"Always sixth grade. They never get past sixth."**

"Ha ha." The Demigods looked around at each other.

 **"Grover," I said, because he was really starting to scare me. "What are you talking about?"**

 **"Let me walk you home from the bus station. Promise me."**

 **This seemed like a strange request to me, but I promised he could.**

 **"Is this like a superstition or something?" I asked.**

 **No answer.**

 **"Grover-that snipping of the yarn. Does that mean somebody is going to die?"**

 **He looked at me mournfully, like he was already picking the kind of flowers I'd like best on my coffin.**

"Zeus, you have polluted the mind of your nephew with your drama!" Cackled Demeter.

"Stop cackling, sister."

* * *

 **Date chapter was posted:** **24th September 2016**

 **Next update: 30th September 2016**


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